


JS&MN Prompt Fics, Drabbles, and Mini-fics

by OfShoesAndShips



Category: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (TV), Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell - Susanna Clarke, Ladies of Grace Adieu - Susanna Clarke
Genre: Aroflux Character, Asexual Character, Demisexual Character, Disabled Character, I do warn for them in the specific chapters, Multi, POC Childermass, Suicide Attempt, not graphic but still, rating is mostly just for triggers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-25
Updated: 2017-03-19
Packaged: 2018-04-17 05:23:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 12,344
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4653942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OfShoesAndShips/pseuds/OfShoesAndShips
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pretty much as it says on the tin.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Conversations with the Crows (Black Joan, The Raven King)

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: Violence, difficult birth, death (not childbirth). None of this is particularly explicit, but just in case.

 

They were the souls of dead men, her ma had always said; the weaker, parasitic cousin of the raven, a sorry sign of the times. But that hardly stopped them. There has not been a single day of her life she does not hear them, burbling in the rafters or screaming on the wind. _Half the time I thought you were crying, it turned out to be the crows. And half the time I thought it were the crows, it turned out to be you._

 

Black feathers find their way into her hair at night, onto the cobbles beneath her feet, into the folds of her skirt; every time, she looks up and smiles. _Thank you_ , she thinks, and puts the feather in her pocket. You never know.

 

-

 

When she is barely sixteen, a man stabs her in the stomach. She falls back into the stinking gutter-sludge, with the mud and the dead leaves and the rain, too breathless to scream, and with the last of her fading vision catches sight of black feathers. _I’m dying, then,_ she thinks. _And you are the one they chose to wear my soul._

 

She remembers no birds, afterward, but a young man - his hair black and green-glossed like feathers, an eerie distance in his eyes. _Joan_ , he said, or she thought he said, and his voice croaked like a man who had never spoken.

 

_Who was he_ , she asks, later, half-conscious in the doctor’s bed - _who, love?_ asks his wife, wan but bustling, tutting over Joan’s bloodstained stays.

 

_I think the crows called him_ , she says, and the woman looks up.

 

_I think you must have dreamt it_ , her voice gentle but reproving still, _and besides, that’s ravens, not crows._

 

-

 

She is nineteen. She is nineteen and pregnant by a collier or a sailor or a smith, something like that, a Geordie either way, passing through York on his way westward. She remembers what he looks like, just barely, and hopes the babe doesn’t take after him. A shiftless kind of bloke if ever there was one, looked like a regular man all watered down like weak gin; colourless eyes, hair like worn cotton, papery skin. She’s hardly pretty, with the kind of face that’s ‘characterful’ at best - but it would look better on the babe than his father’s would.

 

She is eight months, maybe eight and a half, when the cart comes out of nowhere. There is blood, so much blood, and she cannot stop screaming.

 

-

 

_Joan_ , says the dark haired man, and his voice is not so hoarse.

 

  
_Don’t you dare take him_ , she says.

 

-

 

They tell her later there was a crow on the windowsill when they carried her in, that when she saw it her eyes went wild-bright. _Don’t you dare take him_ , they tell her she said, but she does not remember. She does not remember the whisky they forced down her throat. She does not remember them ripping through her dress, her stays, her stomach. She does not remember the way she screamed, the way the baby screamed, tiny and weak but alive, alive.

 

_What will you call him?_ asks the doctor’s wife, that same woman, just as wan and just as bustling.

 

She thinks of a pale man with black hair and eyes as distantly blue as her boy’s. _John_ , she says, _his name is John_.

 

-

 

He is sickly, for a long while. She lines his cot with black feathers, and prays to a different Lord.

 

-

 

_Joan_ , says the dark haired man. His voice has almost lost its croak.

 

She smiles. _Hello_ , she says.

 

-

 

When John Childermass is twelve, he sees his mother hang.

 

Two days later, he finds a black feather in his hair.

 


	2. Horses Anticipating a Storm (Emma Pole)

 

She could hear horses neighing and stamping on the road outside. Men shouting, unable to see that that would only distress them further. The jangle of the reins, the rattle of wheels on cobbles. She sighed and pulled her knees into her chest, perched on the sopha, the chill from the open window crawling down the back of her neck.

 

The low light of the early morning left the room gray and dull - not quite dark enough to require a candle, but dark, even so. The fire in the grate had burned out overnight, the wood turned black and liable to crumble if touched. Her bed was neat still, unslept-in.

 

There was a soft knock at the door and she looked up just in time to see Sir Walter step into the room, looking a little wary. He seemed to have slept as little as she had.

 

“Emma? Emma, my dear, you will catch a chill!” Sir Walter sounded rather offended, as if the prospect of her catching a chill was a personal insult - and he almost ran over to her and took her hand. Her whole, cold hand.

 

“You are quite frozen. Please - perhaps a robe? A shawl? Perhaps you should come downstairs where it’s warmer-;”

 

“I’m perfectly well here, thank you.”

 

“I shall have Stephen bring up some tea, and something light for your breakfast,” he said, patting her hand and reaching behind her to close the window.

 

“I’m not hungry.”

 

“Only something light, some sweet porridge perhaps?”

 

She shook her head and he sighed.

 

“It looks like it may be a nice day,” he said, after being silent for a few moments while casting around for something to say.

 

“There is a storm coming,” she said, without looking at him.

 

“Nonsense,” he said, in what she supposed was meant to be a soothing tone, “The sky is quite clear. Why would you think that?”

 

“The horses told me,” she said, and he winced. _I mean, they are always distressed before a storm - I think they can feel it coming - back home, I could always tell whether a storm was coming by listening to the horses-;_ but she was too tired to bother saying so.

 

He reached out and rested a hand on her shoulder. She flinched away and he pulled back, hurt. “I must go. Perhaps it is best if you retire to bed - you seem tired, my love.”

 

 _I am not your love_ , she thought, _I am your election-fund. Your cause for sympathy._

 

“Well,” he said, with false cheer, “Perhaps Mrs Strange will visit today? You are always brighter when she visits.”

 

 _At least she tries to listen. Even if she cannot see_ , she thought, and sighed in relief when Sir Walter left, shutting the door behind him.

 

-

 

A deep roll of thunder pulled her from the dance and she blinked, lifting her head and staring out of the window at the pouring rain. Her face reflected a thousand times in a thousand droplets. She scrambled up onto her knees and pushed the window up, leaning out. The sky was black and roiling, heavy and thick; rain fell all around her, bitingly cold. She laughed, only a little bitter - _I hope you can feel this where you are, Walter. I hope you can see the rain, the sky - I was right, was I not? I was right._

 

“Lady Pole!”

 

She looked down, to see Stephen standing on the pavement almost directly below her. “Do you not care for storms, Stephen?” she called down, in an over-bright voice.

 

“You will make yourself ill, my lady,” he shouted, running for the side-door. A few moments later she could hear his feet on the stairs and he came into the room, soaked to the skin. She turned to him and beamed, letting the window fall closed behind her.

 

“Lady Pole, your hair is all wet, and your night-gown quite ruined. Please, come with me, there is a fire downstairs by which you may dry off.”

 

“Do you think he will not take me, if I catch cold? Will he find me so disagreeable that he allows me a few night’s rest?

 

“My lady-;”

 

“No, I don’t suppose he would,” she said, getting up from the sopha and squeezing the water from her hair, “Very well, I will come downstairs. Would you fetch me my robe?”

 

-

 

They sat there together in front of the parlour fire as the storm beat at the house, the rain falling even more heavily and the thunder rumbling, wind rattling the windows in the frames.

 

“Stephen?”

 

“Yes, ma’am?”

 

“I am not mad.”

 

“I know.”


	3. Please Let's Go Home (Childermass/Norrell, Childermass POV)

 

It was still dark when he awoke, though a little light from the street lamps shone through a gap in the curtains. He sighed, falling against the pillow and rolling onto his back, careful not to wake Norrell asleep beside him. Norrell never slept well; if he woke up, it was unlikely he’d fall asleep again before dawn, and Childermass had no desire to be responsible for Norrell’s sleep-deprived antagonism come morning.

 

He slid carefully out from under the sheets and picked up his shirt from where he’d left it, folded over the back of Norrell’s desk chair. He shrugged into it and buttoned it quickly, creeping across the room to the door. As he passed, he reached out and laid a hand against Norrell’s blanketed shoulder. He bent and quickly pressed a kiss to Norrell’s temple, regretting it when he felt Norrell stir.

 

“John?” came the hoarse, half-asleep murmur.

 

“I’m sorry, love,” he whispered, “I have to go.”

 

Norrell made a quiet noise in response that Childermass couldn’t quite translate, but he seemed to be sliding back into sleep, so Childermass just squeezed his shoulder and slipped out of the room.

 

-

 

The stairs were dark and quiet as always, and he avoided making them creak as much as possible as he crept up them to his room. Another couple of hours of sleep was unlikely, but he could read a little, perhaps-;

 

“Mr Childermass?”

 

Davey, his hair scruffy from his pillow and hastily dressed in shirt and breeches, stood at the top of the stairs with a candle.

 

Childermass frowned. Of all of the servants, Davey was the heaviest sleeper - the infrequent creaking of the stairs would hardly have woken him. “What is it, Davey?”

 

He paused, looking like he was debating whether or not to speak, and then the words burst out of him in a rush.

 

“I just wanted to say, sir, I know this is for a good cause, n’all, and I don’t mean that I’m ungrateful for you having brought me down here, especially since otherwise I wouln’t’ve met Mary, but, I-;” he sighed, his face troubled, “Mr Norrell’s been good to us, sir - the winter before you came, my aunty were the scullery maid then, sir, and she took ill - well, Mr Norrell called the doctor out for her, not the village doctor but his own, and paid for it out of his own pocket. And now my cousin’s just had a little boy and - well, Ma tells me they weren’t sure my aunty would’ve made it through that winter if it weren’t for Mr Norrell, and my cousin neither - so he’s, in a manner of speaking he’s responsible for my cousin and her son, and I know he gave Lucas’s da a raise once when Lucas’s sisters were born and they didn’t have the money to make it,” Davey cleared his throat, embarrassed, “And speaking of Lucas, sir, you were - you were very kind to him, sir. I know he were hardly discreet - I mean, we all knew, thought he were gonna get sacked for sure, but you were kinder than you had any obligation to be-;”

 

“Davey-;”

 

“Please, sir, let me finish. What I’m trying to say-;” he looked down at his feet, rubbing the back of his neck, “Is that you’re a decent man, sir, and so is Mr Norrell - well, on occasion - and all of us, well, we’d hate to see either one of you hurt. ‘S far as I see it, London hasn’t been good to either of you - there in’t much light in him nor you, less than there were back ‘ome, and-; and, none of us’ll hold it against you if you try’n get some of that light back. If you follow me. We can-; we can keep the new staff quiet, if need be.”

 

Childermass swallowed. “I’m grateful to you, Davey. Truly.”

 

Davey smiled, a quick, darting thing, and slipped away back into his room, the door closing with a quiet clink.

 

-

 

He sat at his desk below the window, the candle on the windowsill, and rubbed at his eyes with one hand. With the other, he reached for his quill.

 

 _I wish we could go home_ , he wrote, the ink seeming so much darker than usual, the letters awkward and thick, a little smudged. He put the quill down and stared at the paper. He knew a spell to make it unreadable to any but Norrell. He knew a spell to put it straight in Norrell’s hand. If he wanted to, he could send it without any fear of discovery - by the servants or that bastard Lascelles, or anyone else.

 

But it would be useless. They couldn’t go home. Not yet. Perhaps not ever. Subconsciously he rubbed at his still-tender shoulder - if he had been just a little slower-; It did no good, thinking about it. A useless waste of time when he could be doing more important things.

 

He blew on the ink to dry the last wet spots and folded it carefully into quarters, like he always did, and rubbed the back of it with the flat of his thumb, where on any other letter - on any _respectable_ letter - the name would go.

 

He sighed, and tore it into shreds.

 


	4. One Foot In Another World (Childermass, a hint of Childermass/Norrell)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Something of a sequel to Conversations with the Crows

 

He does not know it, but his dreams have only ever featured one place. Blue-cast, crumbling, cold. Every ruin in England forming new paths, every stone, every football fractured windowpane, every rainbloated floorboard, every fallen slate and cracked, ivy-crumbled brick.

 

He does not know it, but his dreams have only ever featured one face. A face that drew all the light from his northern skies and held the crags of a thousand moors and mountains in his cheekbones, eyes the grayish blue of overcast skies.

 

-

 

He feels something in the air, the day he meets Norrell. He can see it the way he sees the future in his cards, as if for a moment the world has slipped away from him and he is left with nothing but trails of light and remembered scents, a strange mixture of _seenheardfelt_ that he cannot quite articulate. The word for it is just beyond his reach, but he can think around it, go at it slantwise until he has something which is not it, but almost is. His ma always said it was like looking at the world through the bottom of a glass, and it was, but it wasn’t, too.

 

He sees Norrell from a distance at first, standing in the doorway of a shop to shelter from the rain, and for the smallest fragment of a second he sees a taller man, dark-haired, distant-eyed. He sees the thin lips shape his name.

 

 _When you were born, I saw a raven_ , he hears his mother say, and suddenly he understands.

 

He walks slowly through the rain, quite unaware of how much like his own vision he looks, and offers his hand to the small, fussy-looking man who, for the smallest of moments, he mistook for the King.

 

-

 

It is somehow both easier and harder to see the King in Jonathan Strange.

 

It is as if Strange is a rubbing, a chalk-and-paper version of what the King ought to be. A version, just as incomplete a version as Norrell is, but differently so. For three days after Strange steps into the house, he can hear the beating of wings; he learns to tune it out.

 

-

 

Norrell found a feather on the pillow once, had stared at it as it caught the candlelight and sent it back in a thousand shifting colours.  
  


“What’s this?” he asked, bewildered, slightly scared; Childermass looked up from tying his neck-cloth and winced.

 

“They appear every now and then,” he said, attempting to sound exasperated, “I don’t know where they come from.”

 

It was the first and only time he thought Norrell might dismiss him. But Norrell only breathed out, slowly, almost sighing.  
  


“It seems I will never be free of him.”

 

“We are Yorkshiremen, sir. It’s in our blood.”

 

“More’s the pity.”

 

He could not say, _I can feel him, sometimes._

 

He could not say, _I see him in Strange_.

 

He could not say, _I see him in you_.

 

He could only shrug.

 

-

 

He has been shot. He knows this. He knows it is likely just a laudanum dream. But every breath he draws tastes of home, tastes of magic - he can no longer tell the two apart - tastes of things he’s only half-known his whole life and now can feel all around him.

 

There is writing all around him, and he cannot read it; but he remembers the story his mother told him on every sleepless night, and he wonders. He is not quite dying, and the Raven King does not quite say his name.

 

-

 

He wakes, and sees the King in the chair by his bedside. He blinks, and it is Norrell.

 

-

 

Strange offers him the world - or rather, thinks he does - and for a moment, Childermass hears another’s voice.

 

-

 

He sees the King beneath the hanging tree, and the vision does not shift.

 

But he does not know it.

 


	5. Unearthed Bones (Stephen Black)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Very vague body-horror, ish.

 

 _The king is dead, long live the king_. He can almost hear the cry in his ears as he wanders through the halls. Long live the nameless king in nameless halls, he thinks, and as he walks he wonders at how smaller the crowd of inhabitants seems, now. How many were there besides he and Lady Pole and Mrs Strange? How many coffins hold oak, how many dead bodies danced to the music of another land? How many dead now walk the streets of London, of Manchester, of York and Edinburgh and Birmingham and Dublin and Glasgow, how many trudge along country lanes turned city back-alleys, how many knock at the door of a house or cottage or mansion or bothy, looking, looking, and finding their own eyes in uncomprehending faces?

 

-

 

He tells a young faerie in a scruffy approximation of livery to take away the orb, the sceptre, and the diadem, to put them somewhere he need never look at them.

 

He asks the brugh, politely, for something more fitting.

 

It delivers him a crown of bones and treeroots from which tall flowers sprout in blue and green and gray, and when he places it on his head, he knows.

 

-

 

He does not go looking for them. He could; could offer them a return if they wish it, not to an enchanted exile but to  a place they could call home now theirs have gone. He imagines them finding their names on tombstones and tracing the letters with cold fingers. He wonders if those names feel as strange to them as his own now does; if they would rather take another.

 

He would give them hope again, if he could.

 

-

 

He buries the memories beneath silver polish and soap and the otherworldly songs the new musicians play. The old violist had gone, his arm around the lady in the dress the colour of storms, and the footman said his name had been Orpheo, once.

 

He wishes them well. He wishes them hope, and home, and happiness, everything they have been denied; and yet he knows it is not enough.

 

-

 

He walks the halls and hopes. For so long he has hidden it six feet deep in his soul, bound it up and buried it, and now with every step it shakes loose of its chains. He hardly recognises the feeling, but it grows and grows as the hall is scrubbed and shined, as the memories of horrors rest uncelebrated and free to rot. The brugh grows strong and tall again, as the hopelessness that laid waste to it recedes; stone flows into new shapes and the trees outside grow out of their malevolence.

 

-

 

He is still thinking of them weeks later, of the ladies and gentlemen he danced with that had hollow, faraway eyes; who felt cold and delicate in his arms and choked on unseen thorns at the slightest talk of other places. He imagines them lost under too-close skies, finding themselves carved on gravestones and only half-remembered,  and begins, in his neatest copperplate, to write the invitations.

 

-

 

 _Welcome_ , says the nameless king to his nameless subjects, _to_ _Unearthed Hope._


	6. The Protection of Laughter (Emma/Arabella, Emma POV)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The extracts are from “To My Excellent Lucasia, On Our Friendship”, and “An Answer to Another Persuading A Lady to Marriage” by Katherine Philips.

 

 _For thou art all that I can prize, my joy, my life, my rest_ , she read, and only just managed to refrain from throwing the book out of the window.

 

True those words might have been, but much good they did her. She sighed and turned onto her back, staring up at the ceiling. _Jonathan this, Jonathan that. And he does not even answer her letters, the narcissistic fool. Too busy with his war, his magic, his…everything._

 

The door opened and she jumped, craning her neck to see. “Stephen?”

 

His eyes were sympathetic when she caught them, and then he bowed slightly, stepping out of the doorway, “Mrs Wintertowne, ma’am.”

 

Emma pushed herself up into a sitting position. “Mama?”

 

Mrs Wintertowne stepped into the room and gave her a tremulous smile. “My dear,” she murmured, and the door shut behind her with a soft click.

 

“It has been too long since I have seen you, Mama. And too long since I saw you in a gown that wasn’t black.”

 

Mrs Wintertowne smiled, and sat beside her on the sopha, “Indeed,” she said, “Your husband told me visitors did you little good, but I met Mrs Strange at Lady Westby’s yesterday, who told me quite the opposite. And so I have come.”

 

“I am so glad to see you, Mama,” Emma said, but lapsed into sad silence.

 

Mrs Wintertowne, slightly lost as to what to say, looked about her and found the book Emma had been reading half under Emma’s skirt. She smiled when she saw it, and opened it to the title page, where a dedication was  written in faded black ink.

 

_For my own Katherine. Christmas, 1798._

_Love always, Sarah._

 

“So,” she began, “You have found yourself a Lucasia?”

 

Emma felt herself blush, and Mrs Wintertowne’s lips curved in a small smile. “Will you tell me of her? Since she vexes you enough to send you into the arms of Mrs Philips?”

 

“It is not her that vexes me. She speaks of little else but her husband - good-for-nothing, narcissistic, fickle man that he is - and how worried she is for him - he is at war, and has not sent her a single letter! - and when she is not doing that, she is telling me silly tales of their courtship and expecting me to laugh, when I have never heard anything so hateful!”

 

Mrs Wintertowne stroked her thumb across the fading dedication, not looking at her daughter. “A lying laugh,” she said, and Emma nodded.

 

“Oh, Mama,” she whispered, “I am sorry. But I am so tired, and my patience wears so thin. I did not mean to complain of things I cannot change.”

 

Mrs Wintertowne reached over and squeezed her knee. “Do not apologise, my dear. When you were young, I did precisely the same. I loved your father - not at first, but I came to - and yet, when Susan came to us, I found myself lying with every lighthearted word I spoke. You feel that the lies will protect you, and yet…”

 

Emma nodded. “I find myself - I feel terrible for it, Mama, but I find myself sometimes wishing that he-;”

 

“That he does not come home?”

 

“Yes. Am I horrid?”

 

“You are heartsick.”

 

“I have been every other kind of sick,” she murmured, half to herself, “It’s only right the heart has its turn, I suppose.”

 

Mrs Wintertowne reached over and kissed the top of her daughter’s head, embracing her with one arm. Emma sighed.

 

“Emma?”

 

“It seems that nothing but ill has come to me, these past few years.”

 

For a second, Mrs Wintertowne thought her about to cry, but after a moment she mastered herself.

 

“Will you stay with me a while, Mama?”

 

“Of course,” she whispered, her own eyes damp, “Would you like me to read to you?”

 

Emma nodded. “But promise you won’t let me fall asleep.”

 

“I promise.”

 

She shifted so that she sat in the corner of the sopha, and Emma curled up against her like she had as a child. She blinked the tears away, and opened the book against her drawn-up knee.

 

“ _Forbear, bold youth, all’s Heaven here,_

_And what you do aver,_

_To others, courtship may appear,_

_’Tis sacrilege to her…_ ”

 


	7. Chapter 7

 

Childermass is making tea, and something is the matter.

 

His movements are jerky yet somewhat hesitant, as though he’s convinced he’ll shatter; a muscle in his jaw twitches every time the spoon chimes against the china. 

 

Norrell watches him out of the corner of his eye, wondering what it is that’s put him so out of sorts - he came into the library dragging his feet and drifting his hands across the walls and chair-backs as if for reassurance, and called one of the maids - Lucy, he thinks, although she’s new and he’s not certain - to bring tea in instead of fetching it himself as he usually would.

 

The spoon clinks against the saucer and Childermass flinches.

 

“Childermass?” he asks, carefully, though still making him jump.

 

“Sir?”

 

“Are you quite well?”

 

Somehow, in moods like this - ‘delicate’ moods, as Childermass calls them somewhat derisively - Childermass finds it too much trouble to lie, and so Norrell is not surprised to see him shake his head.

 

“Brewer needed shoeing this morning,” he says a few moments later when he hands Norrell his tea, and Norrell nods. Childermass never has been quite right around the sound of metal-on-metal - he makes himself scarce whenever Norrell must emboss a new leather binding for one of his books - but he seems worse than usual, even so.

 

But whatever it is, Childermass seems unlikely to tell him, and so he turns back to his book, resting one hand against the side of the teacup so he doesn’t forget to drink it.

 

Quite suddenly, Childermass swears, and Norrell’s head snaps up. Childermass is leaning heavily against one of the small tables, his eyes screwed up tight, white-knuckled hands clutching the table edge.

 

“John?”

 

Childermass shakes his head, a quick, jerking movement, and Norrell stands up to tug the bellpull. 

 

A few minutes later, Hannah appears at the library door and sees Childermass - who has now opened his eyes, but still hasn’t let go of the table.

 

“I’ll fetch his crutches, sir,” she says before Norrell can even open his mouth, and rushes off.

 

She returns in a minute or two, the crutches under her arm, and Norrell takes them with a nod of thanks.

 

He walks slowly across the library, noting as he does that Childermass is refusing to look at him; Norrell cannot see the back of his neck from where he is, but he knows from other such occasions that it will be burning red, the only sign of his embarrassment at having shown a moment of weakness.

 

Childermass’s hands unclench slowly, though when he reaches for the crutches he almost snatches them. 

 

He sways slightly as he leans his weight on them and Norrell steadies him with a hand against his shoulder, only removing his hand when Childermass has shifted his weight almost completely to the crutches, letting one foot leave the ground. He rotates it carefully and winces, and then he clears his throat, looking at Norrell for the first time.

 

“Thank you, sir,” he says, his voice slightly rougher than usual and tiny drops of water on his lashes, “I’ll be going down to York later for those books you ordered-;”  
  


“You will be doing no such thing,” Norrell snaps, “You have been neglecting the accounts of late - the estate will not run itself, Childermass.”

 

Childermass stares at him for a moment, nods, and eases himself over to his desk below one of the windows, sitting down heavily and resting the crutches against the desk.

 

Norrell returns to his book and his tea, glancing up at Childermass occasionally and letting himself be soothed by the steady, quiet scratch of his writing.


	8. Collecting Names of the Lovers That Went Wrong (Norrell/Childermass, Childermass POV)

 

It starts so slowly that he doesn’t even know it’s begun until it stops.

 

It begins with words, as most things between them do - letters arriving for him while he’s on a long trip from bookseller to bookseller or auction to auction, letters that sound petty, imperious, until he looks deeper and sees the worry behind, the unease his absence brings.

 

And so he sends letters of his own, at first only in reply and then spontaneously, a few lines here, a few lines there, just to reassure him. And over time, those letters get longer - business matters and short lines letting him know how much longer he’ll be gone turn to pages of inconsequentialities that Norrell chides him for and yet would miss more than he likes to admit.

 

Little sketches appear in the margins, and sharp comments about this person or that, turning to full page drawings that he pores over when he cannot sleep.

 

Somehow, he considers this normal. He does not often notice the ache behind them - and when he does, late at night when he cannot get a nose or eye quite right, when he has had a little more ale than he usually would and gets a little maudlin, he calls it homesickness and ignores it.

 

He has always been good at self-denial.

 

-

 

He has been in love before. There was a girl, when he was young, with a terrible temper and soft eyes, and a young man when he was a little older, before he knew Norrell but just after deciding that the sea was not in his future, a young man with gentle hands who would ask before every kiss and whose softness made him feel brittle, sharp-edged. He could not find it in him to say what he ought to say, could not find the words to ask if they could leave it at that, please, please, curling up together in a narrow bed and laughing over too much drink. 

 

He could not take the feeling, the bitter brittleness, the feeling that there was something missing deep in him - and so he left Whitby feeling like so much broken glass, splitting apart under the weight of his own sorrow. 

 

There is a young man in Scarborough, a small, fussy-looking man with weak, darting eyes  - he looks like nothing more than a startled rabbit, and he reminds John of someone, though he cannot quite place who - and the man is about to be cheated, taken for more money than he ought to be, and John clears his throat and steps in. 

 

The man looks at him carefully. “Why?” he asks, and John shrugs.

 

Why, indeed. He is not fond of gentleman, and he ought to enjoy seeing them fleeced, take some private amusement from it. But thieving is honest enough when you have nothing else - it’s rather less so when it’s just the meanness of a shopkeeper taking advantage.

 

John does not say this. “Why not?” he says instead, and the man offers him a job.

 

-

 

One day, Norrell chastises him for his letters, and this time he seems to mean it.

 

Childermass shrugs, as if it doesn’t matter.

 

Two weeks later, in an Essex pub, he finds himself writing one. He burns it when he realises, and as he watches the paper blacken something in him turns to glass and shatters.

 

-

 

When he returns to Hurtfew, something has changed. There is something between them, a fragile coldness, something sour in the air that seems to choke them both.

 

He wishes he could break it. But he doesn’t know what it is he’s done, or not done, or indeed whether he is to blame for it at all, and he has no idea how to reach out.

 

He feels like he could, like Norrell is expecting him to - but he has no idea, and so he sits there surrounded by the strange fragility, doing the same as he always does and feeling oddly hollow as he does.

 

Norrell looks scared of him, now. The startled-rabbitishness, never far away, has returned, and Norrell’s gaze is forever skittering away from him, his mouth opening on a word unvoiced and falling closed again.

 

“Sir,” Childermass says, one day, and Norrell jumps, looking hunted, and the last pane of glass in Childermass’s heart is kicked in.

 

-

 

“Childermass,” Norrell says, a few weeks later, and Childermass looks up in surprise. Norrell has not been referring to him by name of late, addressing his requests to empty air and leaving them there for Childermass to pick up. His name in Norrell’s mouth sounds strange, pained yet savoured, and Childermass has no idea what to do with the giddy sickness that sound fills him with.

 

“Yes?”

 

“You-;” Norrell stops, and cold fear sweeps through Childermass at the vague flash of a premonition. He knows what’s coming and he cannot face it. He cannot. 

 

“No,” he says, and Norrell looks shocked.

 

“I have not said anything yet.”

 

“You are about to sack me, I can see it in your face-;” _only a small lie. Barely a lie at all, really_ , “And I will not allow myself to be sacked. I have done my job, same as I always have, there is no reason-;”

 

“I did not realise I needed a reason,” Norrell says, indignant, sour, faintly sarcastic, and the thing between them stretches, stretches-;

 

“I’m asking for one,” Childermass says, and it snaps.

 

Norrell pauses. He seems to have no idea what to say, and, after standing there for another few moments he leaves, walking out of the library and letting the door close behind him, loud in the silence.

 

Childermass follows.

 

-

 

“What is it?” he asks, standing in the doorway to Norrell’s room. He does not lean on the doorjamb as he usually would - he feels too wound up for even the pretense of nonchalance.

 

Norrell looks up at him and blinks.

 

“If this is about the letters,” Childermass continues, “I have stopped-;”

 

“It is not about the letters. It is about-;” Norrell breaks himself off.

 

“What?”

 

Norrell stares at some point just to the left of him, and Childermass waits.

 

“They are-;” he stops again. 

 

Childermass says nothing. 

 

Norrell blushes and swallows. “It is nothing,” he says, “It is nothing.”

 

“Didn’t seem like nothing-;”

 

“Please,” he says, “Don’t press.”

 

Childermass falls silent. He feels brittle and shaky in a way he hasn’t for years. “Am I truly dismissed, sir?”

 

Norrell shakes his head, and Childermass breathes out slowly in relief.

 

-

 

They do not look directly at each other for days, after that - all sideways glances and eyes darting away. Childermass finds he can hardly concentrate, the tension between them is so thick - and yet he finds he cannot put a name to it. It is a tension full of unknowing and a mutual unwillingness to lay themselves bare.

 

Mr Norrell seems to ignore it easily, or at least more easily than Childermass can, and if there is an unease beneath their interactions now they are the only ones that know it.

 

Childermass no longer spends his few free evenings in the library, sitting by the fire with a book and his shoes kicked off; he retreats downstairs and sits with Hannah and Dido and Lucas and the rest, both one of them and not - Hannah throws him worried looks and he ignores them, folding himself into a corner and sitting there in silence. 

 

He thinks of Harry rather a lot, now. Harry and his carefulness, his easy smile and bright, bright eyes. He remembers what it was like to kiss him, so odd at first and then becoming commonplace - how at first he had felt empty and awkward, until love carried in with it a need for closeness.

 

He wonders if he had looked as hunted then as Norrell does now - if that had been the reason for Harry’s treating him as if he were fine china, see-through and easily broken. 

 

The realisation resounds deep inside him like the silence of a bell, and it must show on his face for Hannah asks him what the matter is.

 

He waves her off and goes upstairs, forcing himself to go slowly and not run. He refuses to doubt himself as he winds his way through the labyrinth, though he can feel his hands start to shake.

 

He remembers gentleness, and does not clench them into fists.

 

-

 

Norrell jumps when he closes the library door and Childermass stops there, in the shadows of the doorway. For once his mind is blank - he has no idea what he ought to say - and Norrell is staring at him, waiting.

 

“I told you I did not have need of you, tonight,” Norrell says, already defensive, and Childermass does not move - but nor does he look away.

 

“Do you not?” he says, low but not quite a whisper. His voice is hoarser than usual.

 

“What is it?” Norrell asks, impatient now.

 

“I could ask you the same.”

 

“You are not making sense.”

 

Childermass walks slowly forwards, stopping just far enough short of Norrell’s desk that he does not feel crowded.

 

“What is it,” he says, “Between us, that scares you so?”

 

Norrell’s face clouds over, goes cold. “Get out.”

 

“No.” There is no premonition guiding him, this time. Just bloodymindedness, and a hunch.

 

“I said-;”

 

“I know what you said.”

 

Norrell blinks at him, and his lips tighten.

 

Childermass swallows. He cannot see this through with argumentativeness, and he cannot just _act_ -;

 

“When I was sixteen,” he says, quite before he realises what it is he’s saying, “I fell in love, and I would have given almost anything not to.”

 

“Your youthful exploits are of no interest to me, Childermass.”

 

“I felt expected to be a certain way, to - to do certain things,” he continues, his voice breaking half way through, “As - as patient as he was, I could not bring myself to-;”

 

Norrell is staring at him, now. “Childermass-; You truly-; you are not-;”

 

“I would not lie about this.”

 

“Oh.”

 

Norrell looks far less hunted than he did, and Childermass steps forward. 

 

“There is something between us, I know it,” he says, “And, if you are amenable, I would like to find out what it is. But I would never ask more of you than you would freely give.”

 

“Nor I you,” Norrell says, startled into honesty, and Childermass did not realise how tense he had been until he wasn’t any longer.

 

Childermass nods, smiling very faintly, and returns finally to his chair by the fire, picking up the book he had left on the side-table a few weeks previously and settling down to read. He kicks off his shoes, and behind him, Norrell watches him and smiles.

 

 


	9. i saw him down by a river (Pre-canon, Childermass POV)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: Attempted suicide.

 

The wind is cold, but he does not notice. He kicks his heels against the stone of the bridge and stares down at the foaming of the river, shuffling his cards in his hands. He flips the top card - a skeleton stares up at him and he laughs, a harsh, dry sound. Tears do not prick at his eyes, but he shakes - he feels like glass, about to crack apart. He neatens his cards into a stack and presses his lips to the edge before putting them on the wall beside him. 

 

It is only, he thinks, a simple matter. A formality, almost. He swallows, breathes out, breath scraping along the glass in his lungs, his throat.

 

Perhaps hanging would have been quicker - but these are the King’s waters. It is the King’s air he is breathing, the King’s bridge he sits on - all around him he can feel the press of wings.

  

And if he must condemn himself to any’s care, he would rather it be his King’s.

 

He breathes in again. Breathes out.

 

The water is cold. He does not notice.

 

\--

 

He wakes coughing on the bank, the dank taste of the river in his mouth. His ears ring and someone is shouting at him, though he cannot hear it clearly through the water in his ears.

 

“What-;” he whispers, before he is wracked with another bout of coughing, spitting what seems like gallons of water into the mud.

 

 A warm hand touches his shoulder and then takes his arm, pulling him up to his feet and steadying him when his legs start trembling.

 

“You stupid fool,” the person says, though with only softness in their voice, and it takes Childermass a moment to realise what it is he’s seeing.

 

A man not much older than himself, in the uniform of a coachman - though his coat and shoes are missing and he is completely soaked through - his eyes full of concern, his expression almost trembling. The man’s hand tightens on his shoulder and the expression steadies into one of gentle sternness.

 

“Come on, lad,” he says, “I’ll take you up to the house, you can warm up there.”

 

Childermass blinks at him.

 

“Lad?”

 

Childermass tries to speak, but can’t; he coughs until his eyes water and tries again, his voice sounding alien to his ears. “My cards,” he whispers, and the coachman looks at him blankly before comprehension dawns.   


“You left your things on the bridge, aye?”

 

“Aye,” he says, and the coachman pats his shoulder gently.

 

“You stay there, son, I’ll get your things. And then you’re coming up to the house to dry off.”

 

Childermass nods, and the coachman pats his shoulder again before heading to the bridge. Childermass looks around, blinking - even the low light of the evening is too much - and for the first time sees the carriage on the road, just before the bridge. The horses stand quietly and the curtains are drawn, and he cannot raise the curiosity to wonder at it before the coachman is back, pressing his cards into his hands.

 

“Here,” he says, and then picks his coat up from the ground to wrap it around Childermass’s shoulders. It overlaps at the front by far too much and the coachman’s expression begins to shake again. He lifts one hand and pushes the hair back from Childermass’s face, wiping the tears from the corner of his eyes with a thumb.

 

“What’s your name?”

 

“John.”

 

The coachman smiles. “Good name, that. Lucky.”

 

Childermass does not smile. It doesn’t feel particularly lucky.

 

“I’m James,” he says, but Childermass is barely listening - he twists and turns his cards in his hands, shuffling them as he goes.

 

“Come on, then,” James says, wrapping an arm around his shoulders, “You can sit in the carriage for the time being and we’ll be up at the house in no time.”

 

James leads him slowly over to the carriage, and knocks on the door. It opens to reveal a small, washed-out man, his brows raised and his mouth open on a word than never makes itself heard.

 

“Lad had an accident and fell in the river, sir,” James says, “He needs seeing to and there’s no room up front for him-;”

 

The man gestures to the empty seat on the other side of the carriage. “He can stay in here for now, I suppose.”

 

“Thank you, sir,” says James, since Childermass lacks the energy to, and James steadies him as he climbs up into the carriage.

 

He sits as far from the man - the master, he supposes - as he can get, huddling himself up against the side. He feels exhausted and sick; he cannot, he suddenly realises, stop trembling.

 

The carriage starts moving and Childermass groans. He can feel the master’s eyes on him, but doesn’t look up.

 

“It will stop soon,” the master says, “My house is only a few more minutes away.”

 

Childermass does not speak and the silence stretches out, and out.

 

“S-sorry for putting you to so much trouble, sir,” Childermass says, very faintly, still not looking at him.

 

“You are sick and require a doctor - it would be unnecessarily cruel of me to leave you where you were.”

 

Childermass says nothing. “Most would,” he eventually mumbles.

 

It is another long moment before the master speaks again. “What’s your name?”

 

“John,” he says, “John Childermass.”

 

The carriage halts again and there comes the sound of creaking gates. The master smiles, small and thin and tight.

 

“Welcome to Hurtfew Abbey, Mr Childermass.”

 

 

==


	10. i'm thinking i was wrong (Norrell/Childermass, Childermass POV)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A warning for the fact that this contains suggestions of depression and a related eating disorder, as well as making reference to the suicide attempt from the last chapter. It also features Childermass with CP and Aroflux!Childermass.

 

He wakes slowly, a gentle slip from fast asleep to half-awake, feeling heavy and exhausted still, and turns over, unwilling to push back the covers and succumb to the daylight.

 

He presses back down into the pillows, and doesn’t notice Norrell is wide awake and gazing at him until he’s already made a fool of himself. Norrell doesn’t seem to think so, though; his gaze is soft and he is smiling slightly.

 

“Good morning, John,” he whispers.

 

“Oh, don’t remind me,” Childermass mumbles into the pillow, wincing at how terribly strained his voice sounds. He closes his eyes and breathes, feeling brittle and hating himself for it. He isn’t supposed to be feeling like this, now. It doesn’t make sense - and yet -;

 

Norrell lays gentle fingers against the edge of his jaw, and Childermass flinches, opening his eyes. He doesn’t apologise, though the words come and catch in his throat. Norrell has pulled his hand back, but doesn’t look offended.

 

“Are you alright?” he asks, very softly, and Childermass attempts to shrug. One true word could break this, he thinks, and for a second that is all he wants to do; shatter this strange, too-delicate thing between them and go back to how they were before - or further, even, back to only carrying the weight of his own existence, as impossible as it had been.

 

He tastes riverwater in the back of his throat and buries his face in the crook of his elbow upraised on the pillow, breathing carefully through the urge to cry.

 

Norrell doesn’t attempt to touch him again, doesn’t say anything; Childermass feels him get out of bed, hears the soft sounds of him beginning to dress.

 

“Shall I tell them you’re ill?” Norrell asks, in a voice that doesn’t brim with pity - but there is gentleness in it, tenderness, and even that makes Childermass feel sick.

 

It is a moment before Childermass drags himself back together enough to speak above a whisper.

 

“I’ve been through worse,” he says.

 

“I know. That is not what I asked.”

 

They are back to combativeness, or something like it, and his breath comes a little easier.

 

“No,” he says, and slowly rolls over, pushing back the covers and swinging his feet onto the floor. The movement sends him dizzy and he clenches his fists around the edge of the mattress before slowly pushing himself up to his feet.

 

The chair across which his clothes are folded is only two steps away; and yet, halfway there his ankle buckles without warning, send him staggering into the dresser. 

 

“John?” Norrell sounds alarmed and Childermass shakes his head, even though Norrell probably can’t see him doing it. He leans against the dresser, laughing almost hysterically. 

 

“It’s not my day, today, is it?” he says, more to himself than to Norrell. 

 

“Go back to bed,” Norrell says, “I’ll tell Hannah to bring you some breakfast-;”

 

“I’m not hungry,” he says, carefully putting his weight back on his just-buckled ankle and wincing at how weak it feels. He drags his feet as he walks back to bed, and sits back down so heavily that the bed creaks in protest.

 

“But you didn’t eat last night.”

 

“Wasn’t hungry then, either,” he says, and Norrell’s sigh hurts.

 

“John-;”

 

“Fine,” Childermass snaps, burying himself back under the covers, “Go. Do as you think best.” 

 

There is no sound, for a moment, except for their breathing - and then the key turns, unlocking the door, and a moment later the door closes behind Norrell with a heavy, final click.


	11. if i look back and he is screaming (Norrell POV, Norrell/Childermass)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for madame-de-bergamot, who expressed a desire for Norrell's perspective on the last chapter. Forms another part of the series with 'i saw him down by a river' and 'i'm thinking i was wrong' and as such features aroflux!Childermass, depression, and references to a suicide attempt.

 

It is not the first time.

 

There have been nights when he is woken by Childermass thrashing and beating the pillow in his sleep, screaming his throat raw; nights where Norrell has to wake him with his name barked out as sharp as he can muster, nights where Childermass stares at him with wild eyes and, shaking, allows himself to be held.

 

There have been nights where Childermass cannot help but touch him, gentle fingers on his cheek, a hand lacing with his, a kiss pressed to his shoulder. Nights where Norrell cannot help but touch him in return; stroking his palm across Childermass’s tattoos, his scars, falling asleep with one hand pressed to Childermass’s waist - the smallest of things, Norrell supposes, but he has long realised that he needed little else.

 

And then there are the nights between. Nights when Childermass seems off-kilter, when his hands shake and his voice is barely audible. They do not touch so much, those nights, and Childermass’s nightmares are more the quiet kind. Nights when they sleep alone.

 

Childermass had warned him, of course. But knowing in abstract is rather different to waking up to him looking terrified, to reaching to soothe him and having him flinch away.

 

Seeing him walking into the library, his eyes reddenned and his voice scratchy - hearing from James that his fall into the river had not been accidental as it seemed - was entirely different from hearing his heaving breaths, seeing his shoulders shake under the sheets. Being told there was nothing he could do was nothing to the awful uselessness he felt, standing there and trying not to watch.

 

\-----

 

Norrell opens the door and slips into the room as quietly as he can. The mid-afternoon sun eases its way in through a gap in the curtains, shining a thin line across the rug but leaving the bed in almost-darkness. An untouched tea-tray sits on the dresser, the toast and tea long cold. Norrell pauses near the foot of the bed - Childermass sleeps quietly for once, and Norrell would be discomfited did he not suspect it was the sleep of the exhausted. He looks so small under the coverlet, curled in on himself, one hand tucked under his neck and the other slightly stretched out. Norrell goes to the dresser and takes the teatray, putting it outside the door for one of the maids to pick up later, and comes back in to see Childermass hasn’t even stirred.

 

He steps closer, and finds himself reminded of the few long moments before Childermass woke that morning, the soft look sleep gave him, the tangle of hair fallen across his forehead. Without thinking, Norrell reaches down and traces his fingers over the lines in Childermass’s outstretched hand.

 

“Mm?” Childermass blinks bleary eyes and makes a soft noise, turning half-over to look at him.

 

Norrell pulls his hand away, feeling embarrassed, frozen.

 

“Time s’it?”

 

“Almost five,” Norrell says, too loud in the space and Childermass winces almost imperceptibly.

 

“Why’d you let me sleep so late?” he asks, sounding suddenly awake, and he struggles to sit up, getting himself tangled in the sheets.

 

“You seemed to need it.”

 

Childermass doesn’t appear to have heard him, disentangling himself and swinging out of bed; Norrell backs away a step automatically to give him room.

 

“Careful-;” Norrell starts.

 

“I don’t need bloody minding,” Childermass pulls off his nightshirt and dresses hurriedly, his hands moving just quickly enough to betray his tension.

 

“I’m not. You’re no use to anyone if your leg gives out-;” A second too late, Norrell realises what it is he’s said, just as Childermass’s mouth tilts in something vaguely related to a smile.

 

“I’m no use to anyone anyway,” he says, half under his breath.

 

“John-;”

 

Childermass casts him a horribly sharp look, balancing against the chair to get his shoes on. “Don’t.”

 

Norrell can only stand there as Childermass stalks out and slams the door behind him.

 

===


	12. let the river answer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for talk of suicide and suicide ideation. 
> 
> A sequel to the last chapter. The title is from I Feel Your Love by Laura Marling.

 

 

He comes back shaking, sodden from the rain still bucketing it down outside, and comes into the library at well past midnight with his hair still plastered to his face. Norrell looks up sharply from _The Language of Birds_ and stares at him for a second. 

 

“Childermass,” he says, beginning to stand up, and Childermass turns away, walking stiffly over to the fire and tugging his coat off. Under it, he has on only his shirt, and it clings to his skin with rain and sweat. He tosses the coat onto one of the chairs by the fire and sits on the footstool, pushing his wet hair out of his eyes. He says nothing. He doesn’t even move. 

 

“Where did you go?”

 

Childermass clears his throat. “Went for a walk.”

 

“You’ve been gone hours.”

 

“You don’t say.”

 

“You terrified Hannah. She was convinced–”

 

“That I was going to throw myself of’t bridge again?” He spits it like a challenge and Norrell flinches.

 

“Yes.”

 

Childermass didn’t say anything, and something catches in Norrell’s chest. “You didn’t–”

 

“Do I look dead?”

 

“Did you consider it?”

 

“I _consider_ it–” his voice cracks, and he doesn’t finish the sentence. Norrell stands up, then, coming out from behind his desk to sit by one of the chairs beside the fire. He folds Childermass’s coat and hangs it over one arm of the chair before sitting down.

 

“John,” he whispers, and Childermass’s head drops forward, his shoulders hunching. 

 

“Sorry,” he says, very quietly, and Norrell reaches out to run his knuckles along Childermass’s shoulder.

 

Childermass reaches up and catches his hand, not pushing him away but not pulling him closer either. He just clings to Norrell’s hand, and carries on staring into the fire.

 

“Sorry,” he says again, his voice hoarse. 

 

“What for?”

 

“I’m making a right hash of this,” he says, with a little bitter laughter in his voice.

 

“No,” Norrell says, “No.”

 

“I just went down to the village,” he says, “Sat in the King’s for a while. Ran into Lucy’s da and had a pint with him. The man could talk the hind legs off a donkey,” he adds, and Norrell smiles.

 

“So can Lucy,” he says, and Childermass laughs, sounding a little startled.

 

“I was just– I needed air,” he says, and Norrell nods.

 

“Did it…change anything?”

 

Childermass sighs and turns to look at him, then, tucking his hair behind his ear with his free hand. “Why have you not got rid of me? I– I am not–”

 

“You are not _lesser_ for all this. I spoke hastily, earlier. I did not mean it.”

 

“I know.”

 

Norrell turns his hand in Childermass’s and clings back.

 

“I would keep you safe, if I could,” Norrell says, almost choking on the words. As it is they are quiet, very nearly too quiet, but Childermass closes his eyes and draws in a slow breath. 

 

“I would let you,” he says, “If I could.”

 

 


	13. how could I break away from you?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and after all the horrible angst and the angsty fluff, have some pure fluff. Title is from 'Cedar Lane' by First Aid Kit

 

Childermass was humming something as he strolled into the library; he was somewhat lighter of step than he usually was, and there was something in his face that suggested that, were he a more expressive man, he would be grinning rather widely.

 

“What’s the matter?” Norrell asked, and Childermass burst out laughing.

 

“You needn’t sound so suspicious.”

 

“Have you been at the eggnog?” Even Norrell was beginning to smile, in the face of such good cheer.

 

“It’s July.”

 

Norrell made a noise that suggested that had Childermass desired eggnog on this rainy and unseasonably chilly July afternoon, he would have been able to lay his hands on some.

 

Childermass shrugged. “Can I not just be in a good mood?”

 

“You were _humming_.”

 

“Well, why not?”

 

“You never hum.”

 

“I’ll have you know I sometimes go so far as to sing.”

 

“Heaven forfend.”

 

“Come to bed,” Childermass said, then, and Norrell dropped his book in surprise.

 

“ _John!”_

 

“What?”

 

“It is _two-thirty.”_

 

“And?” Childermass really was smiling now, as he reached out to pick up Norrell’s book and close it. 

 

“What will the servants think?”

 

“They won’t care. The only one with impeccable proclivities is Davey, and he’s hardly going to mind.”

 

Heaven help him, Norrell found himself wavering. He wasn’t seriously invested in his work, and it _was_ quite a cold day, and-;

 

Childermass leaned in and pressed a very delicate kiss to the corner of Norrell’s mouth. “Come on, love,” he whispered, and when he reached for Norrell’s hand, Norrell laced their fingers together. Childermass’s smile broadened, just a little, and he tugged Norrell up out of his chair.

 

“I hope this isn’t going to become a regular occurence, Childermass, you dragging me away from work to engage me in scandalous things.”

 

“Oh, do you not?” Childermass laughed, towing him out of the library and into the labyrinth. The little light the labyrinth glowed with was just enough for them to see by as Childermass led him through its winding corridors, stopping every so often to press his free hand to Norrell’s cheek and kiss him.

 

“You really are in a good mood.”

 

“I am occasionally,” he said, and Norrell squeezed his hand sharply for the flippancy.

 

“Ow,” Childermass said, a beat too late, and despite himself Norrell found himself laughing.

 

Childermass stared at him for a second and then kissed him again, slowly and almost too tenderly.

 

“You don’t laugh enough,” he said, when he finally pulled back, and the words took Norrell a second to process.

 

“I laugh precisely as often as I ought,” he said, and the soft, awed look in Childermass’s eyes made him blush and look away.

 

“Come on,” Childermass said, and pulled him down the corridor.

 

==

 

Childermass pulled off his coat as soon as Norrell’s door closed behind them, tossing it over the end of the bedstead before throwing himself down on the bed to take his shoes off. Norrell stood awkwardly by the door for a moment, before following Childermass’s example and stripping down to his shirt and breeches. 

 

“I’ve been thinking,” Childermass said, leaning back a little on the bed, “What you said about d’Montford the other night-;”

 

“His scholarship is terrible-;”

 

“Yes, but his book is good-;”

 

“It’s terrible. It was a waste of a tree.”

 

Childermass laughed. “You said, and you did so don’t deny it, that when you combine it with chapter four of the Pevensie, there could possibly be something there worth looking into.”

 

Norrell came round the other side of the bed and slipped under the covers, and Childermass let himself fall back so his head rested on Norrell’s stomach.

 

“Well, do you not think there could be something else in that vein? In Amis’s collection of folk tales, perhaps? Say the Green Children of Woolpit, or even the older stories-;”

 

“If you are about to tell me that nettles can aid in reversing the affects of shapeshifting-;”

 

“No, no, nothing so direct, but do you not think? Perhaps they contain corruptions of spells, like that extract in Ormskirk you keep fussing over.”

 

“I think you’re casting about for some topic to talk about just so as to talk.”

 

Childermass rolled over, propping himself up on one elbow.

 

“Is there owt so wrong with that?”

 

Norrell shook his head, and reached out to push a stray curl of Childermass’s hair back behind his ear. Childermass turned his head and pressed a kiss to Norrell’s palm.

 

“You _are_ in a strange mood.” Norrell murmured, though entirely without reproof.

 

“I’m making the most of it.”

 

Norrell smiled, and stroked his thumb across Childermass’s cheekbone. “Are you coming to bed or not?”

 

“I am _on_ the bed.”

 

“Just get in,” he said, and Childermass shook his head.

 

“One moment,” he said, rolling back over and pushing himself up so he could dig around in the drawer of the table on his side of the bed. He made a soft, happy noise when he found what he was looking for and then pulled back the sheets, climbing under them to press his cold toes against Norrell’s calves.

 

Norrell squeaked in surprise and Childermass laughed. “Nesh beggar. Budge up a bit.”

 

“I’m comfortable now.”

 

“Well, I don’t have enough room for my elbows. Shift.”

 

Norrell sighed and shifted back a little bit so Childermass could lie on his stomach, propped up on his elbows. It was then that Norrell realised that it had been Childermass’s sketchbook that he’d grabbed from the drawer, and that he was twirling two pencils between his fingers.

 

“Are you going to draw me?” he asked, incredulously.

 

“No, the King of Spain. Of course I’m going to bloody draw you.” Childermass stabbed one of the pencils into his hair to keep it out of the way, and, without any further sarcasm, put pencil to paper.

 

“Must you?”

 

“Why not?”

 

“I’m hardly suitable-;”

 

“Au contraire. Stop tugging the sheets, you’re distracting me.”

 

Norrell desisted in his campaign of trying to bury himself deep enough in the sheets that Childermass would have nothing but folds of fabric to draw, and lay still.

 

“Besides, I’ve drawn you hundreds of times.”

 

“You have _what?_ ”

 

“Oh, don’t pretend you didn’t know-’“

 

“I _didn’t_ know.”

 

Childermass looked up. “You didn’t?”

 

“Of course not.”

 

Childermass stared at him for a second, and then looked critically down at the few lines he’d drawn, before stabbing the other pencil into his hair beside the first and handing Norrell the sketchbook.

 

Norrell looked at him for a long moment, at the sudden tension in his shoulders and the doubtful look on his face. “Do you really want me to see?”

 

“I’m not hiding anything.”

 

“That wasn’t what I asked.”

 

Childermass shook his head, ever so slightly, and Norrell handed him back the sketchbook. 

 

Childermass pursed his lips and then stretched over to put it back on the nightstand, pulling his pencils out of his hair and putting them down on top of it.

 

“It’s not that I mind you seeing,” he said, as he shifted back to lie against Norrell’s shoulder, “It’s…I don’t know. Another day?”

 

Norrell hummed in agreement, threading one hand into Childermass’s hair. Childermass sighed and pressed himself a little closer, lifting his head just enough to press a kiss to Norrell’s stomach through his shirt.

 

“I feel like I should say goodnight,” he murmured, and Norrell, slightly startled, laughed.

 

“It’s the middle of the afternoon.”  
  


“Mm,” Childermass said, into the fabric of his shirt, “Wake me up in a few hours.”

 

Norrell rested his hand against Childermass’s head and nodded, even though Childermass couldn’t see him.

 

They fell asleep to the sound of the rain and each other’s breathing, and didn’t wake again until the morning.

 


	14. Pandemonium

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Written for a tumblr prompt about Simonelli, from LoGA.

_December 20 th, 1811_

 

Having just ten days prior narrowly escaped death while endeavouring to protect a lady I had no desire to render my previous efforts worthless and die for having endeavoured to protect _five_ young ladies. I was at a loss for what to do, however. I had had no time to properly learn the trick of riding earthly horses, and any other form of escape would either be too slow or would attract too much attention.

I stepped out into my mediocre and scrubby garden to think, hoping that the sharp temperatures and fearsome wind would shake loose some great plan to save me from most certain evisceration and a painful, ignoble death. But though I spent as long in the garden as I could bear to – it was far colder than I had supposed, and the snow was doing great damage to my shoes – the only plan I could set upon was the honourable one. I returned to my parlour and sketched out a will, should I be unable to talk my way off the gallows, and then set out for Upperstone House.

It turned out that my morbidity was unnecessary, for by some extraordinary stroke of luck I succeeded in talking my way out of certain death – I dug into my memory and dredged from it the story of my countryman, Mister Gilbert Norrell, and told Mrs Gathercole and her sister-in-law that my actions had been no less than his had been on the day that he rescued Miss Wintertowne – now the wife of a cousin of my closest school-friend, I was sure to add – from beyond the door of death. This they rather hesitantly believed. I said that I could prove it – they bade me do so – I left.

Halfway along the path leading from Upperstone House to the Rectory, which meandered through what I presume in finer months to be excellent pastureland, was that particular chestnut horse I had expected never to be presented with again. He was standing facing me, peculiar intelligence in its eyes. I had no desire to reacquaint myself with anything to do with my cousin John Hollyshoes and indeed for a moment I expected him to appear in spite of my having seen him dead and rapidly cooling, and so attempted to push on, averting my eyes and stepping off the path so as to walk past the four-legged obstacle.

Pandemonium stepped sideways and was again in front of me. I stepped back onto the path. Pandemonium did likewise. I stepped to the other side of the path. Again I was thwarted. We continued in this farce for a solid few minutes, upon which time the horse shoved me in the chest. More stubborn a creature was never known in England, and after a small hesitation I relented and found myself on his back in a trice.

“I have a defence to deliver,” I said, in an aggrieved tone, and the horse seemed to shrug. He led me to my own front gate, deposited me inside it, and gave me a most insolent look.

I took the hint and quickly wrote the letter I was to send with my journal, wrapped both in paper, and walked back out to the gate. Pandemonium still stood on the other side, and I resigned myself to the knowledge that I would be riding back to Upperstone House.

This time, Pandemonium carried me through town – if Allhope could deserve the word - and I found myself the object of many bemused stares. I lifted my hat to them all, very slightly, and I saw some of my parishioners moving on with a little laughter.

Pandemonium whinnied in return, as if laughing himself, and I scowled. Still, I am not so stupid as to aggravate a horse by whose grace I am riding with some degree of dignity, and so I did nothing. We slowed as we approached the gate of Upperstone House, and following some instinct I realised I was supposed to deliver my defence from here. I had two options; I chose the lesser and threw my parcel over the gate.

“Pandemonium?” I asked, and he somehow turned to look at me. It denied all laws of anatomy, but I ignored this. Of all laws I had seen denied these past months, anatomy was the least.

After a pause, during which a long and twisted smirk crossed my face, I spoke again.

“I think I have an estate to claim.”

This seemed to meet with his approval, for suddenly we were galloping away from Allhope so fast that light itself could not catch us, and I had the sense that hundreds of worlds were opening before me. But I trusted to Pandemonium, and on we ran.


	15. Stephen Black/Mrs Brandy

The day she hears that Mr Black has vanished, Mrs Brandy closes the shop for sixteen days. She stays up in the small room above the shop, opens all the windows as wide as they would go, and dances slowly to the mournful music that floats up from the street violinists. Her long skirts swirl around her bare feet and she closes her eyes to imagine polished floorboards beneath her toes and a warm hand helping her spin. She pictures him so strongly that she can almost hear his feet on the rug but she can’t bear to discover him gone so she screws her eyes up tight and spins again, again, again, feeling him catch her every time.

She stops dancing long after night falls and the violinists go; she drifts downstairs and steps outside in her bare feet, feeling spring hiding in the cracks between the cobblestones. The buildings around her sway and ripple like water and she runs into the crispness of the waiting air, ignoring the shouts of people around her, their concern and their cursing. Her hair works free of the pins and flies around her face, whipping like her skirts, and she is lost in the breeze and the memory of dances she never attended but that she can see him in as clear as day and she spins and spins down St James’s-street, or what she supposes must be St James’s-street, for with every spin the buildings grow ever more distant, ever taller, ever thinner, until she is surrounded by trees and her bare toes dig into soft, moonlit grass. In the distance, music begins. From a long way away she hears a familiar voice, and when she spins again she feels a gentle touch against her wrist pulling her out of it.

And for the first time, a king dances.


	16. Hannah/Dido

And while around them England turns, Hannah and Dido – servants of the great magician Gilbert Norrell, who had been of such service to his country during the great war – lie on the same slim bed in the cramped room, listening as soft music creaks through the wireless. Dido shifts a little on the mattress and Hannah throws her hand out, missing her already for the absence of an inch. Dido tangles their hands, raises it to her lips. Hannah clutches, just a little, and reaches out with her other hand to run her fingers through the soft cloud of Dido’s hair, deep and dark against the pillowcase’s soft crochet lace.

Dido smiles faintly, makes a soft sound. She carefully extricates her hand and traces the buttons of Hannah’s shirtwaist, sliding her fingers between the fabric. Hannah bats lightly at her wrist, intentionally ineffectual, and Dido continues, slowly working the buttons free until the small, dark design just below her collarbone is visible. It’s still red at the edges and small enough to look, at a distance, like a large freckle; but this close Dido can trace the bend of the open wings, the tiny spike of a beak. Very carefully she bends close and kisses the skin just above it, with a little nip, and Hannah shivers beside her, running her hand over Dido’s shoulderblade where her own tattoo rests.

Dido raises her head, smiling a little more helplessly, and the song on the wireless changes to one she knows. In days gone she would be up and dancing; but now she is here, with a woman as close to her wife as any could be, and the way Hannah looks at her when she sings in a whisper is worth the pain of all the needles in the world.


	17. Chapter 17

Norrell traces the thick, bleeding lines of Childermass’s tattoo with his thumb, following the rope around his wrist and up his inner arm with a light, languid touch. Childermass hums in quiet pleasure and he shifts deeper into the soft, warm sheets. The only light is that of the blue orb that rests in the air six inches from the palm of Childermass’s other hand. Heavy curtains keep the moonlight out and the heat of summer keeps the fire cold in the grate.

“You don’t talk about it,” Norrell whispers, not wanting to disturb the still ease of the room.

“The tattoo?”

“Being a sailor.”

“Oh,” Childermass says, and he shifts the light with a gesture. It floats up and stretches over them, covering them in a thin dome that scatters the light like water.

Norrell opens his mouth to press and then closes it again without speaking. He runs his hand up Childermass’s arm to his bare shoulder, and presses his cheek against his bicep.

“It was the family business, I suppose.”

Norrell glances up in surprise. “I thought that was pickpocketing.”

He laughs. “That was my mum’s business. Very good at it, she were.”

“I thought she-”

“She were hanged for murder, not thieving.”

Norrell stretches out, rubs his toes against Childermass’s leg. “I’m surprised you didn’t seek vengeance.”

“For what?”

“Her death.”

“Why?”

“On whoever really-”

Childermass stares at him for a second, and then he laughs. “She weren’t _innocent_.”

“Oh.”

The light goes dim for a moment, and then Childermass lets it fall with a sigh. Norrell pulls the sheets up over them both, shifting so he can wrap his arms around Childermass’s thin waist.

“After she died I went to my cousin and his wife in Whitby,” he says. Norrell can feel the soft rumble of his voice in his chest, and it makes him shiver very slightly, “Well. Harendra’s my great-uncle, really. Merchant captain.”

“Harendra?” Norrell lifts his head and looks at Childermass in confusion. Childermass blinks at him, and then goes unnervingly still.

“My great-grandfather was a Lascar,” he says, “From Dehli. Came over with the East India Company.”

“Oh,” Norrell whispers, then lays his head back on Childermass’s chest, “I didn’t realise.”

“People don’t.”

“I suppose you would not – I mean –”

“Make it known? I don’t hide it. People’s presumptions are their own business,” he pauses, “Is it a problem?”

“Why would it be?”

Childermass takes a deep breath, runs his hand down Norrell’s back.

“I find it hardest to think of you having a family.”

“Oh, Christ,” Childermass says, with a laughing breath, “I have far too much family.”

Norrell leans up, looks down at him with a smile. “Tell me,” he says, and Childermass smiles.

“It’ll take all night.”

“You’ll find I’m not sleeping.”

Childermass shakes his head softly, and starts to count them off on his fingers.


End file.
